


I'm in your garden, but I want a forest

by inRemote



Series: at your behest [1]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Character Study, F/F, F/M, Final Fantasy VII Remake Spoilers, Final Fantasy VII Spoilers, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:29:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26699053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inRemote/pseuds/inRemote
Summary: The last time, they'd won. She'd died, but they'd won.This is a chance to do things differently. But different could be worse.Dare she ask for more?
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough/Tifa Lockhart/Cloud Strife
Series: at your behest [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942924
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19





	I'm in your garden, but I want a forest

**Author's Note:**

> for Woodaba!

It was a curious thing, to know the future.

Well, she didn’t exactly _know_ the future. It was hardly as straightforward as that. But the Planet - Aerith had to assume it was the Planet - showed her things. Visions of things that had yet to come. But was that really the future? It was the future that was _supposed_ to be, perhaps. But had it happened before? Had it been planned? Had someone reset the clock, or had fate just been _very_ specific about the details?

And the Whispers. Always there to make sure that whatever it was - fate, a plan, destiny - happened as it should. They were of the Planet, she knew this. But yet they seemed nothing like the Planet. She’d seen the Lifestream - soft greens, flowing, pulsing life. The Planet was life. And yet these Whispers looked like palls of death, grim reapers made very real. They had none of the vitality of the Planet, indifferent to life itself except within the confines of their timetable. Intervening to make sure only the right people died, at the right times. But die they would.

Was this the Planet? _Her_ Planet? Or a Planet that had already survived? One that had decided that all the death and destruction wasn’t worth risking its existence to avert? And Sephiroth, what was he doing? Surely the Whispers would be aligned against him. For all Sephiroth accomplished, he was defeated in that future. The Lifestream was denied to him. Had they aided him by defying fate?

She couldn’t even begin to fathom. The Planet had always made sense to her. It was alive, it hurt, it spoke. But this... This wasn’t right. This wasn’t life. She understood life. She didn’t understand fate.

And stranger still was that, in spite of all this, the fate of the Planet wasn’t the only thing occupying her mind. Perhaps it should have been. Perhaps nothing should have been as important. But something worried her even more. Someone. Well, two someones.

What her visions had confirmed for her was something she had already known. She didn’t need to see the future to know that both Cloud Strife and Tifa Lockheart were the most wondrous souls, and that she loved them both. Both as they were now, and more so the people they would become. Or the people they were _supposed_ to become. And the fear, the horrible fear eating away at her, was that she had undone their future.

She had yet to _meet_ Cloud, but those moments when he was himself - despite himself - were precious, and she couldn’t help but coax them out. She understood, of course. The persona he wore as a mask. It hurt to see him. It hurt to see this pale simulacrum of Zack, to see his memory worn like a costume. But Cloud didn’t know. And truthfully, Cloud wasn’t very good at impressions. That was why she picked away at his comfort zone. Zack was boisterous, confident. It was in the moments where Cloud blushed, stuttered, failed completely to hide how flustered he was that the mask slipped, and she could see him. A hopeless, bumbling idiot driven by love he couldn’t parse.

And though Tifa was still herself, she wore a mask just the same. She didn’t need Mako poisoning to freely sacrifice herself for the benefit of others. Even without her prescience, Aerith could see the way Tifa covered for Cloud so selflessly. Taking those inconsistencies in her stride, no matter how much it hurt. And it did hurt, Aerith could see that too. The way his delusions casually rewrote the past they had shared. And she was so strong, so brave, she carried that pain by herself. Cloud was so fragile, and Tifa would rather suffer in silence than risk breaking him. 

They hurt in ways they couldn’t possibly know. And they would, in time, heal together. Hand in hand, they would find themselves again.

And Aerith? Well, she had to die for that to happen. Her death was pivotal in the events that followed. For Cloud to be restored, they had to follow that path that led to the Lifestream. And for that, Aerith had to summon Holy. And she had to return to the Lifestream. Her loves would surely be lost to the planet without her to guide them back. 

Was it her duty, then, to die? Even now, knowing that they were defying fate, would she still need to succumb to it to save what she loved? Surely this was a selfish wish, to think that she had a future with them. Surely it was selfish to want these things for herself. What was the fate of the Planet, the fate of her closest friends, compared to her desires? 

She’d never voice these concerns to them, of course. Even if she could explain it to them, somehow, she already knew their responses, because she’d already lived one - regretfully brief - lifetime with them. She had become intimately familiar with the things that she loved about them. And so she could picture Cloud’s face frowning, telling her that she was being an idiot and that there was nothing to worry about - he would be worrying, of course, but he hated giving her a reason to worry about him. She could picture Tifa taking her hands in her own and telling her, fire burning in her eyes, that they would do it right this time. That they could fight for their Planet and for each other. 

She could picture Cloud running off on his own, leaving her behind because he knew he was going to beat her to near-death in the aftermath of the Temple of the Ancients. She could see Tifa, already knowing where to find the City of the Ancients, leaping down from the cornucopia and throwing her aside as Sephiroth descended, taking her place-

“Hey. Aerith.”

Her reverie snapped. Tones beloved to her sliced clean through her train of thought, leaving only the mundane reality before her. An inn room in Kalm. The sound of the Lifestream pulsed slow, steady, more vivid without the white noise of Midgar. They’d not been there long. Half their crew was absent - Barrett was calling Marlene on his PHS. Red was doing... whatever it was Red did. She respected him enough not to pry. Her only company were the two people occupying her thoughts.

Cloud wore his perpetual frown of indifference, but it couldn’t mask - worry? Curiosity? “Can you hear the Planet, here? Seems like you were off in your own world.”

Ah, so that’s what he thought she was doing. A useful deception. And Aerith was a practiced liar. But duplicity had gotten her killed before, so perhaps a more honest approach was in order.

“Mmmm. Not quite. I was just... Thinking.”

“Thinking about what?” Tifa inquired.

“About you.”

Tifa flushed. Cloud’s frown deepened ever so slightly. “Her?”

“You.” She repeated, to Cloud this time. “Both of you.”

Cloud fidgeted. He stole a glance at Tifa, and their eyes met briefly, before he turned away, already out of his emotional depth. Tifa overcame her embarrassment quickly enough, ever perceptive. “Is this about... what we saw?”

Aerith wondered how much she already gleaned, patched together from flashes of the future and Aerith’s reactions. They both had seen her die. Likely, they just assumed that was what she worried about. But she had just told them she was thinking about _them_ , and Tifa was incisive where Cloud was oblivious. 

“I’m not sure. Perhaps the things we didn’t see.I don’t want to assume anything that happened before will happen again, bad or... good. I worry that you might feel obligated to-”

Tifa took her hands, and the predictability of the action gnawed at Aerith. But she let them be held all the same. 

“Aerith, whatever happens from here is our story to write. Maybe it’s different from the one we wrote before. Parts of it, I hope will be different. That we can write a happier end. But, that said...”

She flushed again, just a bit. It did not escape Aerith’s notice.

“That doesn’t mean we have to do _everything_ differently, just to prove a point? Some things happen just because they’re good, not because they’re destined.”

Their eyes lingered on each other, burning red into flowing green, far too long for it to not be significant. Aerith was about to ask just _how_ much Tifa had sussed out when the tension was broken with a very pronounced “Right, Cloud?”

Cloud started, and he seemed to be more surprised that he had been looking at them than that he had been caught. “Huh? Uh.... yeah. I guess. Whatever.”

Aerith smiled as he turned away again, as he did every time he edged too close to having _feelings_. That was Cloud, the bumbling, shy soul underneath the lie. She looked forward to the day that the lie fell away. She hoped she was alive to see it, this time.

Tifa stood up, seizing the opportunity to tease Cloud some more. Aerith looked on, letting affection for these two lost souls fill her. She was content with her lot, she realised. Whether or not she would share in it, she would help them find each other. That much was certain. And it was enough.

The thud of the world’s least stealthy man climbing the stairs approached. Cloud had a lie and a half-truth to tell everyone. Aerith wondered if things would be different this time. If Cloud would remember. If Tifa would hold her silence or object. For all Aerith thought she knew the future, it was still so unpredictable.

This was a different future, perhaps.


End file.
